


A Different Kind of Luck

by yuletide_archivist



Category: ReBoot (TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-12-22
Updated: 2004-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-25 07:31:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1639058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuletide_archivist/pseuds/yuletide_archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If you can't find your heart's desire in your own back yard, maybe you didn't lose it after all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Different Kind of Luck

**Author's Note:**

> Written for EmeralineDragon

 

 

They said "Lucky in cards, lucky in love."

Perhaps it was fitting then that Dot had never won a game of cards in her entire life. As she wondered this, she also began to wonder who this mysterious "They" were, and why they would say all these things. After all, they only helped to make people feel bad, which in turn hindered their work.

Right, work. She was doing that. It wasn't easy being the Command Dot Com, but it was her life now. She found herself loving it, too. Lists, organization, files... The fact of the matter was, Bob just didn't understand her.

Oh, Bob was nice, surely, and on some level she did love him. His recklessness was part of what attracted her to him at first. On some level though, too, she was expecting him to... change, maybe. Not stop being reckless, surely, but to even out a little. She was certain he was expecting her to loosen up some, as well. Dot didn't want to 'loosen up', though. She liked herself as she was. She liked order. That's what made her Dot Matrix. It wasn't a surprise that the two had drifted apart these past few clock cycles.

Dot was startled out of her thinking when a hand was gently placed on her shoulder.

"Hey, shug', you look a little down."

The slight drawl of Mouse's voice had become a comfort to Dot during the time both Enzo and Bob were gone. It was Mouse who Dot spent the most time with, Mouse who helped set up the system security, Mouse who was _her_ firewall.

Dot smiled, tiredly. "I'm okay, of course." Of course. Dot was always 'okay'.

"Shug', you know it ain't good for ya' to jus' work nonstop. Ya' overheat, if you don't drain yourself and fall asleep, first."

Dot remembered the last time she went into sleep mode on the job. That was almost disaster.

"You're just sitting here, working on stuff that you MIGHT need to do." Mouse continued, and Dot felt herself redden at the truth. "Everything is covered, and if you're needed, you'll be called. Let me take you home, get some sleep."

Dot knew it was useless to really argue with Mouse, she had her solid voice. Dot envied Mouse in that way. Mouse always knew when it was right to stand your ground, when it was right to compromise, when it was right to just let the other person have their way, and her pride didn't get in the way of this.

Dot quietly cleaned up her desk as much as Mouse allowed before she began to practically drag the sprite to the doorway. As Dot was stumbling to keep up with Mouse, she caught Phong giving Mouse a 'thumbs up'.

"Hey! You were all planning this from the start!"

Sadly, Dot's pride got in the way of a lot of things.

"He was just counting in binary, shug'."

Thankfully, Mouse was at least twice as strong as Dot.

\-----

Dot's apartment was, unsurprisingly, covered with papers and sticky notes of 'to do's'. There was a certain order to it all, though. Of course, only Dot knew this order, and as Mouse began pulling notes off of places to allow room to move around, that fragile order was lost forever, scattered to the wind. Dot let out a small choking sound as she watched Mouse destroy her working "To Do" list.

Mouse trained an extremely unamused eye on Dot.

"Shug', don't you dare try telling me you needed that. This is you we're talking about. You make triplicate copies of receipts 'just to be sure'."

Dot couldn't really argue with the truth of the matter.

Mouse ushered Dot to change to her pajamas and get in bed. Dot found her face flushing at the thought of Mouse being in the same room as she undressed, but the other woman retreated to the kitchen for something for Dot to drink before she went to bed. Dot let out a small sigh of relief and changed as quickly as she could, looking at the mess that used to be her perfectly organized post-it to-do-list.

She looked at her bed and thought how long it would take her to fall asleep. After all, she had so much to DO.

Never the less, the second her head hit the pillow she was fast asleep, before Mouse even came back from the kitchen.

\-----

Her dreams were the same as always. Haunted images, memories of huddling alone in the dark, hoping nothing attacked during the night. Hoping that the central command would still be there the next morning. A comforting image appeared in her dreams tonight, though. Mouse, the warrior, protecting her in the dark. As long as Mouse was there, she could make it to the morning...

\-----

Dot awoke feeling disoriented. There was a warm blanket over her, and the whole bed just seemed especially comfortable. She knew she should open her eyes and get up, but the bed CALLED to her, really. It was practically begging her to stay. Soft and inviting...

"I saw you twitch, shug'. I know you're awake." Mouse chuckled from beside Dot's bed. Dot opened her eyes, remembering Mouse was there. Mouse chuckled again at Dot's slightly squinty eyes.

"Were you here all night?" Dot asked, her voice thick with sleep.

Mouse nodded. "Well, not here, exactly, but of course I stayed, shug'. Ain't never pleasant waking up alone when you went to bed with someone else."

"It's a totally different situation." Dot blushed.

"Would you have rather woken up alone?"

Dot considered this. "...No." She decided.

"Get up, shug', I've been bored to tears while you've slept and got an itching to play cards."

\-----

"You really gonna marry Bob?" Mouse asked, casually. Dot looked at her hand of cards, nothing she could win with. She should have expected that, of course. Mouse looked like a card shark if Dot ever saw one. She hadn't, of course, but if she did she imagined that's what one would look like. The fact that she was half-asleep for the beginning hadn't helped her game any, but she also had a feeling that she would have lost anyway.

"What kind of a question is that?" Dot asked, trying to match Mouse's casual tone.

"Well, you almost married Megabyte-Bob."

Dot felt herself going greener at the memory. "Please, don't remind me." Dot muttered. "That was... a mistake. I was confused. I'm... glad it wasn't the real Bob, though. I just wanted someone that made me feel safe... not HIM."

"You don't feel safe around anyone else?" Mouse's tone was genuinely concerned.

"I feel safe around _you_." The words slipped out before Dot could stop them. She was clearly overworking herself... but it was the truth. Mouse was the only person who Dot felt consistently safe around anymore. Not that it was Bob's fault for being cast into the 'net, or Enzo's fault for a similar fate. She couldn't blame them, but she also couldn't force herself to rely on them anymore. If she needed something, she'd go to Mouse first, when she could get ahold of the hacker.

Revelations of love aren't so startling when it's your job to have revelations, to over think everything. Though Dot was surprised at the lack of whistles and bells she had heard so much about. This wasn't like with Bob. With Mouse... It was simply that she knew the feelings were there now, not that they had suddenly come into existence.

She had always considered herself unlucky in love as much as she was unlucky in cards, and almost everything else.

Mouse smiled, really, a grin, with a hint of teeth showing.

"I never lose at cards."

And Mouse knew what Dot was thinking, throwing her four aces into the center of the table and leaning in to capture Dot's lips in a kiss.

 


End file.
